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[loser]

Howdy.

Haven't posted in a while.  Haven't played in maybe longer.  Maybe 3 years or so..  It's mildly frightening that Girlinhat's "Child Care" thread is still on the front page.

What do I need to know before starting a new game?

[Tawa]

3 years? Read the wiki just to be safe. From what I can see, enough stuff was added in the '12 release to cause a '10 veteran to lose somewhat faster than usual.

[sal880612m]

The release info for 0.34.01-0.34.11 seem to suggest that the biggest dangerous things to watch out for in fortress mode
are cursed dwarves. Vampires, Were-beast and Necromancers as well as

evil regions where the dead and pieces of the dead can come alive, with evil mists and rain

Also syndromes can now be ingested.

I wasn't around for the transition but there is a list of things here:http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2012:Release_information

Basically there is more FUN to be had.

[HooliganintheFort]

Well read the wiki, it'll keep you up to date.

[FrankMcFuzz]

And don't embark near the purple I's. Just. Just don't. Or do. Whatever, I'm not cleaning up your dwarves faces.

[neblime]

a couple things to remember for df2012:
vampires will have an abnormally large blue section in their thoughts and preferences
vampires will often accuse innocent people, always check the accuser
keep your refuse stockpile inside or you won't live to regret it (you'll probably unlive though)
if a peasant shows up with a big showy announcement on your fort it's probably a werebeast in human form, kill it while you can

[Melting Sky]

Edit: Sorry, I originally listed something that was a change from an early version not 2012.

During embark, definitely be wary of evil biomes, particularly the savage ones. You may think that terrifying ocean your otherwise serene woodland embark is next to poses no real threat but the next thing you know you have zombie sponges and sperm whales crawling up out of it and decimating your entire fortress. Necromancer towers are also extremely dangerous and you should only embark within range of one if you are ready to do battle with reanimating armies of living dead.

[puke]

Hey Loser, good to see your mug.  I just started playing again myself, though the biggest changes should be coming in the upcoming release...

Highlights for me are:

undead, including vampires and lycanthropes (various beast forms) that might sneak in with migration waves or diplomats.  Necromancers that might lead invasions and animate every dismembered gib in your fort.

Some more stuff like this that is relevant to adventure mode... desecrated tombs and divine curses and mummies and such.

Evil biomes might have rain or fog that causes syndromes.  Could have mild, fatal, or undeadly effects.

Restless spirits from dwarfs that do not get properly entombed or memorialized.

All of which is weaponizeable.

Massive hauling changes.  Stock piles that can only accept things from feeder piles.  mine carts (that can be launched on parabolic trajectories through the air while being ridden by dwarfs, or skipped over magma like a skipping stone).  wheelbarrows.  Dwarfs carry bins or barrels to pick stuff up in.

I think there was pottery and glazing and beekeeping and medical care (casts, bandages, traction benches) in 2010, so you're probably familiar with all that.  If not.. they are things. 

I feel like invaders make more use of exotic mounts now.  If your neighboring gobbo civ tamed something in world gen, you can bet they'll show up with them during a siege.  I dont remember this happening so much before.

Not sure when the underworld changed from a few isolated rooms to a massive plain... but it did.  accessing it is slightly different than when it was just the random rooms, wiki has spoilers if you want that sort of thing.

edited addendum:

Oh, and I'm pretty sure that there were caverns in 2010, but now there is a whole bunch more moss and fungi and such in them.  Underground farming is slightly different in that you dont need wet mud:  any underground soil will do. 

Lastly, related to that moss, grazers now need to GRAZE.  some large creatures are a little bugged in that they cant consume enough quickly enough, so you cant have a herd of elephants without them starving... but you can domesticate (and milk and shear for wool) some other largish things, as long as they have room to graze on outside grass or inside cave moss.

[AwesomenessDog]

I hear socks are still all the rage.

[greycat]

Dwarves claim and wear new bits of clothing when their old clothing wears out.

Dwarves who run around with bare torsos, crotches or feet get bad thoughts.  Dwaves who run around with worn-out clothing get less-bad thoughts.

[Remuthra]

Shhh, no explanations. Only Fun now.

[thegoatgod_pan]

Dwarves claim and wear new bits of clothing when their old clothing wears out.

Dwarves who run around with bare torsos, crotches or feet get bad thoughts.  Dwaves who run around with worn-out clothing get less-bad thoughts.

This is a really big change: clothes are as much an upkeep item as booze now, they'll always need replacing after a few years.

[TheDarkStar]

Of course, you can ignore clothing thoughts by making the entire fort engraved, making high-quality meals, and setting up a mist machine, or alternately conscripting everyone and giving them armor (which doesn't degrade). Trading for clothes also works well.

Of course, you don't have to worry about that if your dwarves never live long enough for new clothing to become necessary. 

[loser]

Hey Loser, good to see your mug.

Thanks, Puke.  It's good to see you, too.  I ran into SJ over on Sapcebattles, a while back, and I guess we're both there for the fiction.  I dropped by the Shrapnel fora the other day, to look around.  I couldn't even view my own profile, to find out when I registered there.

And thanks, all.  Those are some good places to start.

I started a fort and I'm maybe about to lose it to newb problems like hunger, thirst, or poverty.  I'm not ready for the autumn traders.  The little fuckers are sliding into 'fine,' so they're One Bad Day away from Gross Inefficiency.  I'm turning the last [10] plump helmets into booze and scrambling to butcher the horses that brought me to the site.

I got a stream, no aquifer, sand, fire clay, metals, and flux pretty easily.  Are easy starting sites more common now or is that something the LNP did for me?

As I understand it, the two problems with vampires is that they kill non-vampires and they don't drink booze, while still needing it.  The first sounds fixable with an all-vampire fort.  Does that work?  Is there a fix for their tea-totaling ways?

Do necromancers have to get at the refuse pile to reanimate it?  Can reanimated refuse fly?  Can reanimated refuse destroy doors?  Bridges?

It sounds like mine cart autodump can be used to make quantum stockpiling happen without marking for disposal.  I think that means I could have stone cleanup going on at the same time that an incinerator is in operation.  Is that right?

 I did get a pillbox & drawbridge set up, though the 'creature in way, wall canceled ' issue was new to me.  Is this still an effective way to keep invaders out?

I enjoyed setting up a clothing industry, in the past. It had so many places were value could be improved.  But my dwarves preferred rags and naturalism to putting on the nice, new clothes they made for themselves.  Except, of course, for the occasional left-shoe-obsessed tax collector who would hoard scores of them in every room he was assigned.

Is ΘπÆ┼ still enough for most citizens?  I seem to remember that dwarven economy was... changed?  Eliminated?  Do they still pay for their rooms?  Do I still need to make sure I have enough cheap-as-Brutalism-done poorly rooms around for the scrubs?

[puke]

Spacebattles, eh?  Will have to take a look.

I'm not an expert on much of this stuff.  I played 2012 for about an hour when it first came out, and just started fresh about a week ago.

One of the nice things about the embark previews now, is it tells you straight up if you have flux or sand in one of the first few layers.  So it's easier to find what you want without having to embark and re-embark.

Can't comment on LNP specifically.  It makes some modifications to the RAWs and includes a memory hack program that replaces the SDL code with essentially a DF-rootkit.  One of the things it might do is disable aquifers. 

I play unmoded except for graphics, these are my current favs: 

http://dffd.wimbli.com/file.php?id=2087

http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=138697

http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=105376.0

Vamps don't have to be a problem.  They'll get thirsty and feed on a dwarf every so often, but if you take the time to identify them by sorting through your units list for dwarfs that neither eat nor drink nor sleep, you can ferret them out.  Then its just a matter of sticking them in their own squad or burrow or locking them in a room, or pitting them in an arena.  They can be a perpetual motion source for a pump or lever, or operate a workshop, or you can use them to contaminate a well to make a vamp military.

I think the "need alcohol" thing is a placeholder for not having fed, and it goes away after they drink.  I'm not 100% certain on that.  The stat boots from being a vamp should outweigh the penalty for alcohol withdrawls though, mine are super fast.  And I think you can always pit them an animal to feed on.

Not sure if Necromancers need LOS, or if they have a range, or if they can reanimate every random thing on your map.  Have not had one yet, myself.

Minecarts are indeed a method of quantum stockpiling.  One of the best methods i've heard is a two-pile system, with a two tile cart track joining them.  Main pile accepts from anywhere, and feeds the small pile through the cart.  small pile only accepts from the feeder pile.  I am intending in my current fort to have workshops specific to individual stone types (or whatever resource) and feeding them with quantum piles fed by carts.  We'll see.

Constructions and bridges are still undefeatable by building destroyers.  Some attackers (animal men tribes, some cavern creatures, titans and forgotten beasts) can fly.  Also, gobbos can sometimes have flying mounts.  so... your bridge would need to actually make a full seal to a roof when closed, not just cut off walking access.

ΘπÆ┼ is more than enough.  I make the stunty little buggers sleep in a common room.

There is no more economy, for now.  So, no rents, no wages, no dwarf-run stores.  No Guild representatives, no Cults...  I particularly miss those last few elements. 

You still get a manager and nobles and such.  I think there were some significant fixes with nobles and consorts and all that, but I can't remember what the specific deal was.  Foreign nobles (diplomats, liasons, generals, etc) are replaced each time they leave your map, so you wont see the same guys invading or trading twice.  They will be reappointed though, so no fear that traders or invaders will stop coming...  Though I do think that mounted invaders stop being mounted, after the first time you meet the guy who tamed the animals (part of the world-gen process).